


Gravity

by LauraCeleste



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-08
Updated: 2017-08-08
Packaged: 2018-12-12 22:01:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11746044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LauraCeleste/pseuds/LauraCeleste
Summary: "Though the sensation of Ra's blade slicing through his gut was still fresh, her words cut deeper than the killing blow." Rewriting the last scene of Season 3 ep 12 from Oliver's POV.





	Gravity

**Author's Note:**

> I have become enamored with this show thanks to Netflix, currently only up to Season 4 ep 8. As much as I love Felicity and recognize her as my spirit animal, this scene stuck in my craw. It felt wildly out of character, and I'm not sure if it is the icy edge to her words or just how sudden it was. I felt bad for Oliver, who just came back from the dead and is getting a dressing down which you KNOW he would internalize as his own fault. So I set out to rewrite it. By the time I finished, things happened on the show that made my heart happy and it ended so well that I almost gave up on this fic. But a vignette is a moment in time, and I hope you will agree these things needed said.

“I need some air...glad you’re not dead.”

This was not how Oliver expected this conversation to go.  
  
He had days to consider how it might unfold on his long flight back from the sacred peak; daring to imagine the elation waiting on him upon his return. In fitful sleep he envisioned it, interspersed with nightmares of the cold dark nothingness and the warm happy lie ( _“I’ll stay…”_ ) that his mind had fabricated to erase his regret. After dying, being resurrected at the hands of long lost allies, and escaping a league of the best assassins in the world, he considered it a gift to return home to the people who loved him and to restore a city who was struggling in his absence. There was trepidation at facing the team knowing that he had ultimately failed, but they all had failed before and been stronger for it. He needed that to be true, for the next time failure would not be an option. His uneasy alliance with Malcolm would be the difference. He expected that news to be a shock to everyone considering their dark history.

But Felicity...he had not expected this. She stormed past him seething with fury; the person he had looked forward to facing the most, now the one person who refused to face him.  
  
He followed her out to the damp alley, old emotional wounds ripping open as he tried to figure out what had brought this on. She began to walk away from him the second she heard his footsteps and he pursued her.  


“Felicity…”

“‘I need some air’ really means ‘I don't want to talk right now,’” Felicity snapped over her shoulder, her hostility staggering him.

“...I’m sorry,” was all he could think to say, hoping it would buy him time to recover from the surprise and form a more coherent response.

“For what?” She asked, rounding on him. He numbly readied himself for a dressing down and told himself he probably deserved it. “Maybe you could be a little more specific. For letting us believe you were dead for weeks…”

Indignance smacked him in the face at the idea that he “let her” believe. His side suddenly spasmed to remind him of exactly how true that belief had been.   
  
"I was kind of in a dead zone!" He angrily yanked up the right side of his jacket to reveal the ugly jagged wound not yet healed. The double meaning had the impact he was looking for; he knew she would get it, Felicity loved her double entendres. He immediately regretted it upon seeing her horrified grimace.  
  
"How...." she breathed as she saw the wound that should have killed him.  
  
"Wasn't my time."  
  
"You're not, like, a vampire now or anything, right?" She mumbled, then shook her head. "’Cause it would be easier to believe you standing here with a wound like that if you were undead."

Now that sounded like Felicity; the corners of his mouth quirked upward, betraying the mood.

“How could you possibly think I wanted you all to believe I was dead? Don’t you think if I had even the slightest chance to come home earlier I would have? C’mon Felicity," He shifted his stance in desperation, trying to get through to her common sense. “You know me better than that. What’s really going on here?”  

Felicity threw her head back and groaned. “And you should know me well enough to know that I will never, NEVER…” she stepped closer as she emphasized the second word. “...be okay with this. You’re abandoning every principle you claim to have by getting into bed with Malcolm Merlyn.”

“Felicity…” he pleaded. He took another step toward her but she backed away from him, her raised palm saying not to come any closer. Five feet away, and yet he felt they were a million miles apart again. 

“Uh uh. No. Just….” she started to turn around again and walk away. 

“I need him right now. To train me.” He was unable to hide the desperation in his voice; she would not listen forever and he needed to make a point. “This thing with Ra’s - he destroyed me, Felicity. He beat me. I lost. It was over. I. FAILED.” Daring a step toward her again, he hoped she would see what losing did to him and her wall would crumble, but she stood her ground defiantly. 

“What part of ‘head of the League of Assassins, most dangerous man to walk the earth’ did you not understand? They call him the freaking Devil’s head!”

“And I’m going to have to fight him again. He will come for me. But this time I will be ready.”    


Felicity held her hands to her forehead in frustration. “Malcolm Merlyn, Oliver! Malcolm. Freaking. Merlyn. You’re asking Darth Vader to train you to fight the Emperor. How is this okay?” 

“It’s not okay. But it’s necessary.” He paused for a second, taking a deep breath to calm his racing pulse. When he spoke again his voice was rough with emotion. “If I don’t do this, we die. Thea. Me. Malcolm himself. Probably our friends and family to prove a point. Please trust me, Felicity. If there were any other way….” 

He allowed himself to hope that the emotion that crumpled her face was understanding of his plight and not frustration. When she began to speak her voice cracked and she had to start over.

“The truth is that this is all very overwhelming. And crazy. And just...just stupid.” She shook her head and rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands. “This isn’t like a video game, Oliver, you can’t just reload a save and try again! You only have one life here. You choose how you want to go on living it. But I just… I don’t know if i have anything left to go through this again.”

She took a deep shuddering breath and it was all Oliver could do to maintain his distance. A month of fantasizing about this moment, about the various levels of restraint he would or would not show in greeting her, and yet here he was forcing himself to stay back. For the first time he saw some of what the past month had been like for her and he ached to fix it but he was paralyzed by fear that she would push him away. That rejection, coupled with everything else going on, would have snuffed out his last remaining light, the one that had lit his way back home.

He wished for just a second that he could give her the memory, the one his mind had rewritten, showing her how he wished things could have been. But the divide between fantasy and reality was too great that it could only lead to pain.

“So Merlyn…." He inhaled sharply, dreading the answer to come but wanting it all out in the open. "...Is he the only reason you’re upset?” 

She groaned and threw her head back. “Are we really going to have this conversation right now? Ok. Ok.” She pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed.   


“While you were gone for almost a month, I allowed myself to fantasize, to dream,” her voice had changed with those words, became plaintive and almost wistful. “That maybe, just maybe Merlyn was wrong, that you were alive and that you would come back and that when you did you would be different.” 

And there it was. There was the root of her anger. He was right, it was all his fault. 

Felicity continued, taking a step toward him in earnest. “...That almost dying would give you a new perspective on life, that you would just do things differently.”

“Things between us, you mean,” he said flatly. He felt like he had handed her his bow and asked her to fire it at him. 

“Before you left, the last thing you said to me... was that you loved me.” She said the words as if they were they were the most beautiful thing in the world to her. His brain spun to interpret, curious where she was going with this. Realization suddenly flooded his mind; he had not taken into account the gravity that finally saying aloud what he thought was obvious to everyone would bring. Though he had felt lighter once he had gotten it off his chest, he had only shifted that weight onto her heart to carry while he was away. The weight of those words would have been massive, considering he had not given her the chance to respond. But now that he had returned, it seemed she was trying to give it back.

“Now you're back, and the first thing you tell me...is that you’re working with the man who turned your sister, a woman you're supposed to love, into a killer, who killed a woman you used to love.”

The weight of her words echoed in the air like the twang of a bowstring as the arrow released. The ground seemed unstable; he felt heavier, burdened with a sudden guilt he had banished months ago. She was right; the women he loved had a bad habit of ending up hurt or worse. She was always right. He loved her for always being right, even when it hurt.

“I don't want to be a woman that you love.” 

The proverbial arrow found its target. He gaped at her as she walked away unburdened, his mind jammed with responses and reactions. There was panic at the thought of losing her, shock at the pain her words had brought, horror at how true they were, and acceptance because he felt he deserved it.    
  
Though the sensation of Ra's blade slicing through his gut was still fresh, her words cut deeper than the killing blow.   
  


 

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_Reviews or comments are always appreciated, but never demanded or required. I appreciate any feedback, positive or negative. Thank you for reading!_

_~ LauraCeleste ~  
_

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